Mark Hamill Reveals How George Lucas’ ‘Episode IX’ Would Have Ended

Before Disney bought Lucasfilm and launched a new Star Wars trilogy, George Lucas had made a number of treatments for a sequel trilogy of his own. That would have seen Luke, Leia, and Han back as older versions of themselves, dealing with the aftermath of the Empire’s fall. Obviously, that plan didn’t happen, as Lucasfilm decided to go with J.J. Abrams’ idea instead, but elements and pieces of Lucas’ plan did make it into the new movies. Mark Hamill recently explained how Lucas would have ended Episode IX, with an idea that Rian Johnson ended up putting in The Last Jedi.

Hamill told IGN that the last film in Lucas’ new trilogy would have ended with Luke dying after he trained his sister in the ways of the Force:

I happen to know that George didn't kill Luke until the end of [Episode] 9, after he trained Leia. Which is another thread that was never played upon [in The Last Jedi].

Lucas had a number of threads of ideas for his new movies, many of which Lucasfilm probably still have and may be allowing their directors to use for inspiration. The new trilogy is no doubt very different from what Lucas had planned, but it’s cool to see some little threads of ideas here and there from the guy who created it all.

Hamill also talked about how doing the movies in this new trilogy is different from having one director call the shots for all of them.

George had an overall arc – if he didn't have all the details, he had sort of an overall feel for where the [sequel trilogy was] going – but this one’s more like a relay race. You run and hand the torch off to the next guy, he picks it up and goes.

Rian didn’t write what happens in 9 – he was going to hand it off to, originally, Colin Trevorrow and now J.J. [...] It’s an ever-evolving, living, breathing thing. Whoever’s onboard gets to play with the life-size action figures that we all are.